Carnacki

My brother recently released a cd.  Rather than review it myself (who would ever take seriously a review from a family member?), I've decided to cut and paste a review done by the good folks at Aquarius Records in S.F.

CARNACKI, THOMAS  "Far Voyage From A Placid Island"  (Alethiometer)   
cd  11.98
       Thomas Carnacki is the pseudonym of Berkeley's Gregory  
Scharpen who can be found lurking around the theater departments of  
various troupes as a sound designer and creative foil. On occasion,  
he's also been a member of the live ensemble for irr. app. (ext.) and  
has even taken the stage during a couple of Nurse With Wound gigs.  
Far Voyage From A Placid Island collects four of the compositions  
that Scharpen has created for stage in collaboration with a handful  
of eccentric Bay Area musicians. The first piece finds Scharpen  
working with Jesse Quattro for massing of breathy aerations, deep  
bellowings, and subterranean creakings above a sustained dark timbral  
hum. At first this piece has all of the acoustic richness of the  
brilliant Andrew Chalk / Jonathan Coleclough record Sumac bundled  
with horror film grimness and hymnal vocals from Quattro swathed in  
reverb. Scharpen's collaboration with Jesse Burson (who is the dapper  
gentleman from Big City Orchestra) is a much more cacophonous affair  
collaged from slurps and creaks that sounds like a sucking chest  
would above chiming bells and shards of glass. Jon Brumit (who you  
may remember from his exceptional album of recordings from things  
found at the SF landfill) and Scharpen bring crackling vinyl from 78s  
(you know how much we LOVE that!!!) to wintery ambience and eerie  
blurts from distant horns. The final track is a solo work, again  
featuring that unnerving horn sounds in the distance with cyclical  
metallic drones that bring Nurse With Wound's Homotopy To Marie to  
mind; a more accurate comparison would be Metgumbnerbone, but who the  
hell has heard of them? Very well done indeed!